Introducing a new process: DMTO
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DMTO is a technology that uses coal or natural gas as raw materials instead of oil to produce ethylene and propylene. Ethylene and propylene are the most important chemical products in the world today, and they require a large amount of oil for their production. Ethylene and propylene produced using DMTO technology are more competitive in the market than those derived from petroleum. The successful development of industrial DMTO technology helps to reduce China’s oil imports and opens up new avenues for the country’s olefin industry. On August 24, the People’s Government of Shaanxi Province and the Chinese Academy of Sciences officially announced that the world’s first industrial-scale DMTO (methanol-to-low-carbon olefins) plant, with a capacity of 10,000 tons, has been successfully tested in Shaanxi. As a **major technology development project**, this achievement was successfully developed through collaboration among three parties: Shaanxi Xinxing Coal Chemical Technology Development Co., Ltd., which served as the main entity responsible for innovation; the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, which provided its independently developed pilot-scale technology; and Sinopec Luoyang Petrochemical Engineering Company, which brought its strong capabilities in engineering technology development and related fields. Following the evaluation by ** level of scientific and technological achievements, it was determined that the industrialization technology developed through independent innovation in this project is at the international leading level. At present, the preliminary preparation work for the 3 million tons per year methanol-based low-carbon olefins production project in Yuheng Industrial Park, Shaanxi is progressing smoothly.
Regarding this issue, everyone can discuss it to broaden their knowledge!
GTM—Methanol production from natural gas; MTO—Olefins production from methanol; GTO—Olefins production from natural gas; GTP—Polyolefins production from natural gas; GTE—Ethylene glycol production from natural gas. Here, G represents natural gas； M represents methanol ； O represents olefins ； P represents polymeric olefins ； E represents ethylene glycol ； MTO technology is a method that uses methanol as a raw material to produce low-carbon olefins such as ethylene and propylene, and methanol can be obtained from natural gas and coal. As a result, MTO technology serves as a bridge connecting natural gas chemistry, coal chemistry, and petroleum chemistry, helping to alleviate the problem of heavy reliance on crude oil in olefin production. The MTO process was first proposed by Mobil Oil Company; subsequently, companies such as BASF, Exxon Oil Company, UOP, and Hydro also invested in its development, thereby advancing the industrialization of MTO. In China, institutions such as Tsinghua University, the Petroleum University, and the Academy of Sciences of Sinopec have carried out research on MTO technology. Tsinghua University and the Petroleum University collaborated on research into MTO technology, with the Petroleum University responsible for the evaluation and selection of catalysts, while Tsinghua University was in charge of reactor design. However, the project is currently progressing slowly and remains at the laboratory testing stage. In 1995, UOP presented its patents for MTO technology at the International Gas Conference held in South Africa. UOP’s experimental plant in Norway, with a capacity of 0.75 tons of methanol per day, has been operating successfully for over 90 days. A plant in Nigeria with a capacity of 7,500 tons of methanol per day is under construction and is expected to come online in 2007. This technology can be considered reliable for the following reasons. 1. Its reaction-regeneration unit is similar to that of an FCC unit, and the LORP unit is essentially the same as that of a naphtha ethylene plant ； 2. The development of computer simulation technology has made such amplification possible ； 3. UOP Company promises to provide an unlimited warranty for repairs.
It was only after reading liuze78’s official moderator explanation that I understood a little bit:D I need to learn more*
This technology is still very complex; it’s quite satisfying to have completed the pilot tests. Since the level of scaling design in our country is still relatively low, more investment should be made in this area to achieve larger-scale development as soon as possible
The industrial test unit has been successful, and work is currently underway on the process package design for the large-scale industrial plant.
One can’t simply believe what is reported in the news; as for how good this technology really is, time will be needed to prove it
It seems that according to what they said in the end, the performance was quite good: the methanol conversion rate was over 99%, and the yield of dienes was over 79%. I didn’t expect there to be so many problems along the way; if the catalyst suffers significant wear and damage, it definitely won’t work in the future! “I’m Mian. Brother, it seems you know a lot about DMTO. I really hope to talk more with you, but I don’t know how to get in touch. Could you tell me?^_^
A fluidized bed regeneration system is used, so the gas-solid separation task is primarily carried out by the cyclones located inside the reactor and regenerator. However, if the catalyst powder is too fine or present in excessive quantities, some loss will inevitably occur. Moreover, MTO catalysts are very expensive – at least 10 times more costly than FCC catalysts
The MTP process refers to the production of propylene from methanol, for which patent rights belong to the German company LURGI. The Shenhua Baotou coal-to-olefins project now uses DMTO technology; let’s see what the results are.
The price of the catalyst is 10 times higher than that of FCC, which means it costs 200,000 yuan per ton! Based on the typical FCC specific consumption of 0.8 kg per ton, the cost of processing 1 ton of methanol catalyst is approximately 160 yuan; when this cost is allocated per ton of olefin, the cost per ton of catalyst comes to around 500 yuan.